Verification for new members

[Kindred]

Or we could finish up coding and testing and get a real release of 2.1 out...

[SatTrkr]

Auke: Sure, just click on my link to my website (the little round ball under my name of the left side of any post generated by me) and when you get to my website click on the link to my forum (located on the left side) and then at the forum the Registration Instructions will be the first topic.

[Auke]

for the most part CAPTCHA is worthless.

Hmm, yes, that seems correct: http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=525081.msg3718231;topicseen#msg3718231 If spammers can even enter SMF forum... But then again, maybe this one wasn't just a bot.

Topical question would probably be best. Lets see if I can find a mod in which I can enter my own questions and answers.

Cheers,

Auke

[Arantor]

2.0 comes with anti-spam questions but unfortunately in 2.0 they're not multiple language.

As far as other options go, there's a few mods around but the best answer consistently has been anti-spam questions

And I know this because in 2.1 I rewrote it to support multiple languages.

[SatTrkr]

I am using SMF version 2.0.7 and it lets me enter my own questions and answers!

[Auke]

I am using SMF version 2.0.7 and it lets me enter my own questions and answers!

I'll try to find that option, by default I've gotten a captcha with 2.0.8. And I guess then I got to find questions which have the same answer in both English, Dutch en French.

[Auke]

Auke: Sure, just click on my link to my website (the little round ball under my name of the left side of any post generated by me) and when you get to my website click on the link to my forum (located on the left side) and then at the forum the Registration Instructions will be the first topic.

Thanks, found it. And as a bonus I now got a way to remember how to spell your forum name!

[Arantor]

Hope it works out for you.

[SatTrkr]

I am using SMF version 2.0.7 and it lets me enter my own questions and answers!

I'll try to find that option, by default I've gotten a captcha with 2.0.8. And I guess then I got to find questions which have the same answer in both English, Dutch en French.

You'll find it under Admin - Configuration - Security and Moderation - Anti-Spam  and is located at the bottom.

[Auke]

Yes, found it!

I've decided on a simple captcha, and 3 non-lingual questions: "7 x 5 = ", "1 5 9 13 ?? 21" and "B DD HHHH". What do you guys (gals) think of this?

Auke

[Arantor]

First one is terrible. Bots can solve that, and if they can't, they can put it into Google which can.

Second question can be found in the first Google result for the sequence.

Third question is probably too obscure for most people. FFF is the logical progression but it's not intuitively obvious.

* ‽ is not sure why he is replying, given that all his previous comments appear to have been ignored.

[Auke]

First one is terrible. Bots can solve that, and if they can't, they can put it into Google which can.

Second question can be found in the first Google result for the sequence.

Third question is probably too obscure for most people. FFF is the logical progression but it's not intuitively obvious.

Okay, thank you. I almost know nothing about the capacities of bots, but from your answer I understand they can search the net for answers. Let me think about some other questions.

* ‽ is not sure why he is replying, given that all his previous comments appear to have been ignored.

I don't understand? In your first reply you said that anti-spam questions are best. Your second reply was not addressed to me, but my previous answer combined those two facts into non-lingual questions. Your third reply was about me, not to me. The fourth was about language selecting (I already got all 3 languages installed) and about you making backport changes if you could be bothered. Reply five was underscoring reply 1. In reply 6 you hoped a suggestion of another member worked for me, and this is reply 7. Where did I willfully ignore you?

Auke

[SatTrkr]

Yes, found it!

I've decided on a simple captcha, and 3 non-lingual questions: "7 x 5 = ", "1 5 9 13 ?? 21" and "B DD HHHH". What do you guys (gals) think of this?

Auke

I have found that the combination of my registration process and the three questions being asked (and they can be trivial like yours but you may want to give yours some more thought) should be enough to discourage spammers and bots. Spammers and bots don't usually answer emails from your forum and I require at least one responding email from the registrant with their first and last name after they have already registered. I also use the StopForumSpam website to check their IP address, email address and username (in that order) which catches 90% of them. The rest that don't respond after 7 days are deleted since they are more than likely spammers and bots and that is as far as they will go, i.e., they won't respond with a confirming email. I hope that what I have gone through as a newcomer to the forums and presented here helps you out and saves you a little time for your registrations.

? Sorry if I am butting in but I thought it would be worth my time to explain what I do as it may be of help to others. I would only expect responses from Auke directed to me since this is his thread seeking help. Other users have chimed in and that is great for Auke as the more information the better for him. I didn't think I am required to respond to the respondents other than Auke.

[Arantor]

It's not just you specifically.

Yes, anti spam questions are best but in my first post I made it quite clear that while they are best in general, they simply don't work for your use case!

Other users have chimed in and that is great for Auke as the more information the better for him. I didn't think I am required to respond to the respondents other than Auke.

Considering it's a conversation, the entire point is that we all share knowledge. When it's made fairly clear that this particular avenue is sub-optimal at best, continuing to push it... actually doesn't help.

I wasn't asking for people to reply to me. I was kind of hoping that people would have taken what I've said on board before replying. Yes, I get that they work for you. They work great for me too, but they don't work for everyone, and that point was covered off up front, and yet here we are going over the same old ground again, in a way that will almost certainly not yield positive results.

[Auke]

@ SatTrkr:
Thank you for your answers!

@!?:
I thought you ment to say that questions weren't a good solution for my website because of the fact that they can only be asked in 1 language while my forum covers 3 languages. This is why I thought about using non-lingual questions instead. Am I now correct to assume that non-ligual questions usually just don't do it?

Auke

[Arantor]

Pretty much, yes. I was just trying to avoid having to go through the entire merry-go-round of discussion to get there.

The only reason lingual questions work well is because bots aren't smart enough to parse them yet, or more typically, Google isn't smart enough to parse them yet.

[SatTrkr]

* ‽ is not sure why he is replying, given that all his previous comments appear to have been ignored.

As you can see your cryptic message has confused both Auke and myself. If you have something to say to someone just identify that person directly and say it so there is no doubt who your comment is directed to, i.e., instead of the word "he" just use either Auke or SatTrkr, or whoever that comment was directed to. Clarity is the best option when we are trying to learn something from others. Actually it would have been much better to take the professional route and not have issued that comment at all since it actually is a flame comment.

Anyway, I hope Auke will be able to determine the best path he would like to follow and I wish him the best of luck on his new forum.

[Auke]

Pretty much, yes. I was just trying to avoid having to go through the entire merry-go-round of discussion to get there.

The only reason lingual questions work well is because bots aren't smart enough to parse them yet, or more typically, Google isn't smart enough to parse them yet.

Ahhh, okay. I already thought of some other questions, but in 1 of them I actually tell people to just use Google if they don't know it...
"Par????ibo", "Ceiba pent..... (Google)", "## %% ?? %% ## %%" and "guianas???forum" (the last one is the actual forum name).

Well... I just have to hope that you can be bothered to work on the multilingual intro than, which would allow me to put both the Registration Agreement and the verification questions in 3 languages.

Auke

[Arantor]

Well... I just have to hope that you can be bothered to work on the multilingual intro than, which would allow me to put both the Registration Agreement and the verification questions in 3 languages

This is the sort of thing I mean. It's already completely possible to have multiple language registration agreements. The only missing component is selecting a language before you go to registration, there are multiple mods for this, one of which was already specifically outlined in this thread. That's the only headache you have on that score.

As you can see your cryptic message has confused both Auke and myself. If you have something to say to someone just identify that person directly and say it so there is no doubt who your comment is directed to,

Fine. To you specifically: reiterating how wonderful something works for you when it has already been outlined as not suited to the situation at hand - and doing a little self promotion on the side - is actually counter productive because all it's done is breed false hope that a feature will work as expected.

i.e., instead of the word "he" just use either Auke or SatTrkr, or whoever that comment was directed to.

Third person context is a wonderful thing. I was ruminating that I did not understand why I bothered to reply given that my comments (which were directed at the thread in general) seemed to be ignored, to the point where I specifically found myself quoting my own post.

Actually it would have been much better to take the professional route and not have issued that comment at all since it actually is a flame comment.

It did precisely what it was meant to do: get your attention to what I'd said because I don't come here for my health. I come here to share some of my experience and every single time I feel like I'm offering my thoughts and wasting my time in the process because of the ongoing feeling that people aren't listening to what I say. It's the same reason I left the SMF team in the first place (which is a shame since I was making great progress on 2.1, but given the way things are...)

[Auke]

Well... I just have to hope that you can be bothered to work on the multilingual intro than, which would allow me to put both the Registration Agreement and the verification questions in 3 languages

This is the sort of thing I mean. It's already completely possible to have multiple language registration agreements. The only missing component is selecting a language before you go to registration, there are multiple mods for this, one of which was already specifically outlined in this thread. That's the only headache you have on that score.

I seem to be unable to find that 'specifically outlined' mod in this thread. Would you be so kind to point me to it? Given that my forum is not open for the public, I may just start over again, depending on what I think of this mod.

As you can see your cryptic message has confused both Auke and myself. If you have something to say to someone just identify that person directly and say it so there is no doubt who your comment is directed to,

Fine. To you specifically: reiterating how wonderful something works for you when it has already been outlined as not suited to the situation at hand - and doing a little self promotion on the side - is actually counter productive because all it's done is breed false hope that a feature will work as expected.

Well, it at least gives me, as a newbie, some ideas about what else could be possible in other situations. This is all a learning process, after all.

It did precisely what it was meant to do: get your attention to what I'd said because I don't come here for my health. I come here to share some of my experience and every single time I feel like I'm offering my thoughts and wasting my time in the process because of the ongoing feeling that people aren't listening to what I say. It's the same reason I left the SMF team in the first place (which is a shame since I was making great progress on 2.1, but given the way things are...)

Welcome to the club. I'm usually happy if 50% of what I write and 10% of what I say actually sticks with people. My experience is that getting mad about it usually doesn't help. It does help, however, to bring your message in an unambiguous way. A short message (requiring multiple later messages for clarification) is in the end more labour intensive than a single long message which says it all.

Cheers,

Auke